


Update

by Iverna



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-04
Updated: 2017-05-04
Packaged: 2018-10-28 03:13:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10822560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iverna/pseuds/Iverna
Summary: …in which Han helps Leia in the only way he knows (or maybe the only way he’s allowed).





	Update

Leia is in the middle of organising another supply convoy when she feels her world fall apart again. For a moment, she can’t breathe, her heart thumping loudly enough to drown out the hum of old machinery and the bustle of conversation and orders in the command centre. Her eyes seem to be stuck, staring at the holographic display.

It was bound to happen sooner or later, of course. The star maps need to be up to date. Some updates take longer than others, and this one, fraught with political implications, has taken longer than most already.

It hasn’t mattered. Stories travel faster than updates, especially among spacers. But the update, it seems, has finally caught up.

Leia stares at the spot on the hologram where, since childhood, she has found home.

The tiny symbol denoting _planet_ has been replaced by one for _asteroid field_ , along with the relevant warnings.

Her heart thunders. Her eyes sting. Her lungs can’t seem to draw enough air.

Alderaan is gone.

_Gone, gone, gone,_ her heart pounds.

And she knows: she needs to get out of here. She can’t face this here, now, in the middle of a meeting.

She looks up, eyes sweeping the room, looking for the door. For escape.

It’s all the way at the other end, and between it and her is the meeting, the one she is supposed to be sitting in on. General Rieekan is still talking to Luke and Commander Narra, their heads bent over a datapad with the convoy’s inventory. Han is watching them from where he’s leaning against a console, an impatient look on his striking features, probably about to tell them that no sensible smuggler would try the route they’re considering.

Her eyes are just sliding past him when he looks up, and she’s sure that he caught her looking.

She needs to get _out_.

“Leia?”

It’s Luke’s voice, and he sounds concerned. He looks it, too, when she meets his eyes. Leia tries to remember her expression from before, tries to remember how she looks in meetings, but she can’t seem to feel her facial muscles at all.

_Gone, gone, gone._

Luke is going to ask what’s wrong. Worse, he or Rieekan or someone will figure it out, the evidence blazing right beside her.

And if anyone tells her they’re sorry, or asks her if she’s okay, or offers so much as a sympathetic look, she knows she’s going to break. She can already feel the crack.

She looks away from Luke, a desperate attempt to stall, but it leaves her looking at Han instead. His eyes flicker past her to the hologram, and then back, and he seems to straighten, no longer lounging against the console. He _knows_.

His mouth opens, and for the briefest moment, she thinks he’s going to say it. She can almost hear the words already, can see them in his eyes, in the way they’ve softened ever so slightly. She can’t brace herself; it’s already too late for that. It’s too late to run. He’s going to say it. He’s going to—

“Oh, hey,” Han says. “They finally updated the charts. You mind if I grab a hard copy, princess? Your techs never upload ‘em to the _Falcon_ in time and I’m getting real tired of yelling at them about it.”

And just like that, her heart is thundering for an entirely different reason. This man and his... his... Of _course_ it’s all about him.

“You could try asking nicely,” she snaps. The sharp words come easily, like loading a blaster, and with them comes an angry kind of relief. A relief that, for the briefest instant, she would swear he feels too.

He scoffs. His hair is sticking up at the front, and there’s a smudge of grease on his cheek. He does not look like someone who should be in an official meeting in the command centre of the Rebellion. “I thought I just did,” he says, and his tone does not belong here either, casual to the point of insolence. “What, you want a royal petition? Do I have to say pretty please?”

“Oh, no, by all means, help yourself,” Leia tells him acidly, the words flooding back to her. She no longer feels cold. Anger is warming her all the way to her toes. Her eyes have stopped stinging, and she has drawn herself up without even noticing. “That _is_ your specialty, after all.”

“Only ‘cause other people won’t do it,” he fires back. “Even though it’s supposed to be their job.”

She shrugs. “It’s not the techs’ fault that the _Falcon_ is so old that it’s not even compatible with Rebellion equipment.”

“That’s not—”

“Captain Solo, please,” Rieekan cuts in, sending Han a stern look and glancing at Leia as if to make sure she’s okay with letting him mediate. “You’re welcome to take a hard copy of the charts, as her Highness says. If you’re having trouble connecting to our system, maybe Anselm can take a look at it.”

“Don’t bother,” Han says, waving the issue away as he leans back against the console again. “Chewie and me’ll figure it out.”

They get back to the convoy plans, Han shooting down Narra’s route suggestion as expected and moving over to the hologram to point out a different one. Still seething, Leia manages to drag her mind back to business, and her mind becomes clear again, her heart no longer pounding, just aching in that dull, persistent, familiar way she has learned to live with.

Alderaan is gone. But she is still here.

Han’s eyes keep lingering on her throughout the rest of the meeting, as if he’s looking for something. And there’s that odd feeling again, like he’s relieved somehow.

Probably because Rieekan intervened before she could finish insulting the _Falcon_ and move onto insulting him, Leia decides. Yes, that’s probably it. Got to be.

Well, she thinks with a savage kind of satisfaction, that’s what he gets for picking stupid fights with her. He should know that by now.

Idiotic nerf herder.


End file.
